Documentos de Académico
Documentos de Profesional
Documentos de Cultura
A major advancement of the Affordable Care Act, or ACA, is that Millennials entering
the job market are now able to remain on their parents health insurance until age 26.1
This is not an option, however, for the many lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and
queer, or LGBTQ, Millennials who have left or been forced to leave their homes because
of family rejection related to their sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression. This issue brief provides an overview of the other ways in which the ACAespecially the expansion of state Medicaid programshelps LGBTQ young people without
homes gain access to the health care they need.
1 Center for American Progress | The Impact of the Affordable Care Act on LGBTQ Youth Experiencing Homelessness
2 Center for American Progress | The Impact of the Affordable Care Act on LGBTQ Youth Experiencing Homelessness
3 Center for American Progress | The Impact of the Affordable Care Act on LGBTQ Youth Experiencing Homelessness
Conclusion
The ACA has created many new opportunities for LGBTQ youth experiencing homelessness to obtain health coverage and health care. State governments can help address the
remaining gaps in coverage by extending Medicaid eligibility to former foster youth who
were enrolled in Medicaid through age 18 in another state. In addition, Medicaid expansion in all states is a critical component of assisting all people who need financial help to
afford health coverage and health care, including homeless LGBTQ young adults.
Shabab Ahmed Mirza is a Research Assistant for the LGBT Research and Communications
Project at the Center for American Progress. Kellan Baker is a Senior Fellow with the LGBT
Research and Communications Project at the Center.
4 Center for American Progress | The Impact of the Affordable Care Act on LGBTQ Youth Experiencing Homelessness
Endnotes
1 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Young
Adult Coverage, available at http://www.hhs.gov/healthcare/about-the-law/young-adult-coverage/index.html (last
accessed August 12, 2016).
2 Andrew Cray, Katie Miller, and Laura E. Durso, Seeking Shelter: The Experiences and Unmet Needs of LGBT Homeless
Youth (Washington: Center for American Progress, 2013),
available at https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/lgbt/
report/2013/09/26/75746/seeking-shelter-the-experiencesand-unmet-needs-of-lgbt-homeless-youth/.
3 Abigail English, Jazmyn Scott, and M. Jane Park, Implementing the Affordable Care Act: How Much Will It Help Vulnerable Adolescents & Young Adults? (Chapel Hill: Center
for Adolescent Health & the Law and San Francisco: National
Adolescent and Young Adult Health Information Center,
2014), available at http://nahic.ucsf.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/VulnerablePopulations_IB_Final.pdf.
4 Ibid.
5 Bryan N. Cochran and others, Challenges Faced by
Homeless Sexual Minorities: Comparison of Gay, Lesbian,
Bisexual, and Transgender Homeless Adolescents With
Their Heterosexual Counterparts, American Journal of Public
Health 92 (5) (2002): 773777; Cray, Miller, and Durso, Seeking Shelter; Susan Rabinovitz and others, No Way Home:
Understanding the Needs and Experiences of Homeless
Youth in Hollywood (Los Angeles: Hollywood Homeless
Youth Partnership, 2010), available at http://www.hhyp.org/
downloads/HHYP_TCE_Report_11-17-10.pdf.
6 Rabinovitz and others, No Way Home.
7 National Health Care for the Homeless Council, Medicaid
Expansion: Improving Health & Stability, Reducing Costs &
Homelessness (2013), available at http://www.nhchc.org/
wp-content/uploads/2013/02/NHCHC-Medicaid-ExpansionPosition-Paper.pdf.
8 The Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured,
Medicaid: A Primer (Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation,
2013), available at http://kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/
medicaid-a-primer.
5 Center for American Progress | The Impact of the Affordable Care Act on LGBTQ Youth Experiencing Homelessness